Summary of Feedback from Game Testing

Gameplay

Overall Experience

Mean: 7.1

Mode: 8

From this we can see that most testers had a positive experience playing our game, with just 1 tester having a negative experience.

Game Difficulty

Mean: 4.9

Mode: 5

From this we can see that 50% of the testers found the game slightly too difficult and 25% found it a more than slightly too difficult

A couple of suggestions for improving the difficulty were to increase the range of the grappling hook "Better Grappling Range" and "The grapple feels very short range on level 4." Based on this feedback we will take a look at increasing the grappling hooks range to help with the difficulty.

A couple of suggestions were to add checkpoints to the larger level: "Some kind of checkpoint should be great" "The last level could be helped with some checkpoints or respawning on where you land maybe? but I still found it quite rewarding." Based on this feedback we will look at adding some checkpoints to the larger levels, but other changes to improve the difficulty would be done first to see if this would still be required.

Some of the suggestions were to add a tutorial "Mostly a matter of a clear to tutorial to teach mechanics and techniques" "A clear explain the different guns and controls, tutorial level or something" and after observing the testers playing the game we think adding a tutorial level with some tooltips would definitely be beneficial to understanding how players can use the grappling hook to move around.

Likes

Much of the feedback for what did you like about the game was about how the movement feels good and how swinging is fun "The grappling feels great! Movement feels fluid and relatively predictable." "It has decently smooth movement and its fun to try and beat your previous time" "the concept of swinging everywhere" "The grapple mechanic was very fun, it was quite tricky at first but once i got used to it i really enjoyed it" "Speeeed. Very satisfying to make grapple and go fast." "Good implementation of grapple mechanics" "Very solid main mechanic" "The mechanic of swinging the rope was fun" "Grappling is fun when it works" "The movement, when done correctly, feels good." "The forward motion of the player and the grappling effect and swinging effect makes the game feel and look fast paced. The graphics of the grappling gun are great!"

Dislikes

Some of the feedback for what testers did not like  about the game was about the pre-stage countdown timer being an interruption to the gameplay "the three second timer at the start of each run is a bit of a drag when youre dying frequently, i wanted to get straight back into it!!" "The boost sometimes break the game and the 3 seconds warm-up whenever you restart the level break the continuity of the gameplay." Using this feedback we have added a setting to the settings menu for the countdown time:

More of the testers here wrote how they disliked the range of the grappling hook, and lack of tutorial.

Movement

From this feedback we can see that:

• Most of the players agreed or strongly agreed that grappling felt good, with 2 disagreeing. 
• Most agreed or strongly agreed that walking feels good.
• About half of players agreed or strongly agreed that jumping feels good, with 3 disagreeing.
• Most players agreeing or strongly agreeing that boosting feels good, with 4 disagreeing.
• Most players agreed or strongly agreed that overall movement felt good with 1 disagreeing.

Based on this feedback we will work to refine the jumping and boosting to make it fell better, as it had the most negative feedback.

Controls

From this feedback we can see that most of the testers agreed or strongly agreed that the controls were intuitive.

From the open feedback we received, we got some more suggestions about the grappling length, with some suggestions to add a way to change the distance of the grappling while grappled "Some way of lowering or increasing the tether length when hooked would be good." "Implement a way to wind/unwind the length of the grappling line to lift the player over obstacles." This would be a good thing that we will try to implement.

Levels

From this we can see that most testers agreed or strongly agreed that levels were intuitive but some disagreed or strongly disagreed, and there was a higher level of disagree for if the players knew were to go in the levels. 

The open feedback we received had a few suggestions about the larger level needing some more indication of where to go in the level "in larger ones have arrows pointing towards the goal" "Change the last level so its easier to find the exit whether that be highlighting with a texture/lighting" "Some sort of mario galaxy fly by shot when entering to show where goal is." "More color and light so I can tell where I'm supposed to be going." We agree with this feedback and will be changing the larger levels to be a bit more intuitive and easier to work out where you are supposed to go, using different lighting and a more direct line of site to the end portal from the beginning. 

We also received feedback about the level restarting needs to set the player to look in the same direction "the player faces the same way every time game reloads." We have added this into the game now:

Countdown Timer

From this we can see that most players thought the countdown timer was the right time, but a few did thing it was too long. This has been addressed by adding the countdown timer to the settings menu, as shown in an above section.

Menu

From this we can see that no testers had a problem with navigating the menu, but some disagreed that the menu looked nice, which is true it is very ugly :) we will be working on making it look nicer.

The open feedback for what can be improved about the menu was all about making it look nicer "Better font/custom menu background" "the overall look and feel of the menu" "Effects like sound or button movement when the button is clicked."

Style

From this we can see that nobody disagreed or strongly disagreed that the style suited the gameplay. With this feedback we will continue to make things in this style.

Price

From this we can see that most testers would pay $5 or less.

From the open feedback we received, a lot was simply suggesting they would pay more if there was more levels, there were also many suggestions for adding a global leaderboard, which is something we are trying to get working :) we are just working out how to host the leaderboard.

Price feedback quotes:

"Global scoreboard, steam workshop/custom levels"

"Animations, Sounds, Many levels, global(and curated) leaderboards."

"More levels and gameplay mechanics. By the way I'd happily pay $5, not just less than $5 haha"

"more levels, smoother graphics"

"More Levels and maybe some more refinded grappling controls"

"Better graphics and smooth grapple"

"Make it a full blown game with multiple levels and maybe some powerups"

"More levels, exciting soundtrack, fun leaderboard intergration"

"More levels and polish maybe"

"Building more of a world and style into the game, maybe story."

"This + a whole lot of content would be a great little speedrunning game. And maybe a highscore replay a la trackmania would help with competitive spirit?"

"I think a game like this would require additional features to be more than a sort of $15 niche game. It's very good, just very specific if that makes sense. Sort of like how Portal is."

"More of content, smoother controls"

"More levels"

"More intricate graphics and grapple gun features. e.g. It could grapple on to an object and pull it out of the player's path."

Thankyou to all that tested our game and provided us with feedback :)